About Biodiversity and Conservation, MSc - at University of Sheffield

Develop your knowledge about major conservation issues and their human and environmental drivers across a range of ecosystems. Gain the skills you’ll need to understand how we can balance human needs with efforts to address the biodiversity and climate crisis.

This course will prepare you for a career protecting biodiversity in a range of natural, agricultural, and urban ecosystems around the world.

You'll learn all about conservation issues in major ecosystems, from tropical forests to cities, and coral reefs to the deep sea, and the constraints posed by budgets, policy, and legislation. We’ll also show you how environmental change can impact biodiversity and how the effective management of ecosystems can positively impact both biodiversity and the ecosystem itself.

Fieldwork is a big part of the course. You'll gain hands-on experience in designing and conducting projects in the field, helping you to understand the challenges faced in real-world conservation projects. You'll also receive training in the principles of experimental design and data collection, equipping you with the key skills to plan, manage, and generate data from your own research.

To embed your learning, you’ll take part in a residential field course on the North Norfolk coast, one of Europe’s premier wildlife sites and a region with significant conservation challenges and varied management efforts.

The biggest part of your course is your independent research project. Here, you’ll spend three months researching an area of biodiversity or conservation that matches your interests, ready for your future career. You could be field-based, lab-based, or complete a computational data-driven project, tackling topics such as urbanisation, ecosystem services, tropical deforestation, and marine conservation.

Gain extra experience

We’re home to the Julia Garnham Centre, an NHS badged genomics facility, partnered with the Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust.

As a postgraduate student in the School of Biosciences, you'll have the opportunity to volunteer in the centre alongside your studies. You can work with NHS scientists and academics, learn how to diagnose genetic disorders such as cancer or rare inherited disease, and get involved with NHS genomic research projects.

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Entry requirements for this course

Contact University of Sheffield to find course entry requirements.

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